Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Senate's on your side

Not so swift was the Senate's passage, 20-2, with 13 not voting, of Sen. Denny Altes' bill to keep trial lawyers and others with commercial interests from seeing accident reports for 90 days after they are filed. I'm no lawyer, but this sounds unconstitutional to me. Sen. Joyce Elliott asked how the state could bar certain people from seeing accident reports. Altes claimed all could see it as long as they signed a statement promising not to use the material for commercial purposes. But that's not what the law says. It creates an exclusive list of people who may see the reports. It also is apparently written, inadvertently or not, to disqualify tabloid-format newspapers from being among those allowed to see the report.

On Friday, the Arkansas Legislative Council soundly rejected a bipartisan effort by two senators to to create a temporary legislative subcommittee to study race relations in the state.

Gov. Asa Hutchinson apparently felt the burn from KARK's exclusive Tuesday night on his plans to cut state support of War Memorial Stadium in half beginning July 1, 2018. He has a so-far secret plan to make the stadium self-sustaining. We bet that doesn't include state support.

The State Police say Brett McCullough, 52, of Hot Springs, was killed by a hit-and-run driver while riding a bicycle about 8:47 p.m. Wednesday on Highway 70 West (Airport Road) in Hot Springs.

Arkansas Court of Appeals Judge Bart Virden of Morrilton, who narrowly survived attack ads by an outside partisan group supporting his opponent for re-election to a nonpartisan seat, doesn't intend to let the matter drop.

KFSM reports that the Benton County Election Commission will recount votes today in two squeaky state House races where incumbents are currently on top by scant margins.

The Arkansas Supreme Court continues to grapple, with divisions, on how to square new federal and state law on resentencing people who got life without parole sentences for capital crimes committed when they were minors.

Enjoy these photos from today's dedication and re-installation of a new Ten Commandments monument. The first iteration of the monument was installed last June but destroyed within the next 24 hours when it was rammed by a man in a Dodge Dart.